“I thought the Nazionale was very unlucky,” Mancini added. “Especially in the second leg when they wasted a lot of chances, but football is a very strange sport.

“There are days when it’s all going against you and you can’t do anything about it. This is why we won’t see Italy in Russia next summer.

“In all national teams, there has to be a generational shift at some point, and Italy are obviously at that moment, but I think they will soon get back to being leaders in the football world because there are a lot of talented youngsters coming through.”